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Tuesday, January 3, 2017

Death at Ten

Roo at Five

Roo was five years old when we headed to a summer family
reunion. With both my boys being special needs, I didn’t let them run around on
their own. Other, older, wiser family members said they would be fine playing
with the other kids. I nervously let go and took a deep breath. I joined in the
adult activities and started to relax. Little did I know, five years later my
family would still be paying for not keeping the boys close at hand.

Oh, we had a great time at the reunion. I had thought
everything had gone well. There weren’t any incidences with my kids that I had
heard about, and I enjoyed seeing all the relatives. Both of my boys were diagnosed as speech-delayed around two-years-old, and they both still struggle to express themselves. Maybe that’s why I
hadn’t heard about what happened at the reunion or even months later.

Roo’s sixth birthday neared. He started having anxiety
attacks. I thought he was anxious about his birthday. I tried to talk to him,
but the communication didn’t go well. He brought up the family reunion from a
year ago, but I didn’t understand what he was going on about.

Another year passed. His seventh birthday. He hadn’t really
talked about the family reunion but he brought it up as his birthday neared. Odd.
He had sessions with a licensed clinical social worker. I mentioned the reunion
and how he brought it up around his birthday. Why would he be upset? The
therapist tried to talk to him with me out of the room. After, he agreed that
Roo seemed troubled but he wasn’t clear enough to know why there was an issue.

Roo’s eighth birthday came. He had started to dig and injure
the skin around his fingers until they bled. He’d dug at them so much, he
deformed his nail beds. Therapy continued on a regular basis, but his anxiety
continued to escalate. By now, he was seeing a speech-language pathologist in
school. He had started to communicate more effectively.

My husband and I sat down with him to discuss the reunion,
his feelings, and what might have happened. It wasn’t easy. Emotions were high.
The events didn’t come in order. It took hours to finally piece together what
had actually happened. To our dismay, we learned that the group of kids he had
been playing with told him he would die on his tenth birthday because he drank
bad water from the drinking fountain at the campground where the reunion was
held.

Unbelievable! Could he really believe that it would take
five years for him to die? My husband and I looked at each other in disbelief.
We tried to explain to him that he was fine. The water he drank wouldn’t kill
him five years later!

No. He was certain he would die on his tenth birthday. Time
after time, we discussed the impossibility of that happening, but we couldn’t
convince him otherwise. We had many sessions with his therapist and therapists
to follow. Roo was convinced he would die the day of his tenth birthday.

Honestly, it was hard to understand why he would believe
these young cousins and relatives who he hardly knew rather than his own
parents and therapists who had had training in dealing with children who had
anxiety disorder, but he did.

The demons continued. His ninth birthday came and went with
much anxiety.

I still can’t wrap my mind around how he could believe
something would happen five years after the fact. I later learned that
situations in his mind are blown up enough to cause him post-traumatic stress
disorder (PTSD). PTSD is a mental health condition that's triggered by a
terrifying event — either experiencing it or witnessing it. Symptoms may
include flashbacks, nightmares and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable
thoughts about the event. With Roo, the actual event might not be terrifying,
but in his mind, it becomes absolutely petrifying.

His ninth year was riddled with emotional issues, behavioral
problems, anxiety, damaged fingers and bitten and bruised lips. The number of
therapy sessions increased but did little good.

Roo at Ten

The night before his tenth birthday, he was inconsolable. He
knew he would die. The kids had told him so…five years ago. He believed that if
he stayed awake, he wouldn’t die. He forced himself to stay awake and stay up
all night moving and pacing and worrying and crying.

What can a parent do but to help their child through a
traumatic event like this? Yes, I was angry…angry that this incident happened,
but I realized those kids had no idea what they had caused. How could I be mad at them? I was angry at Roo. How could he believe those kids and carry it with
him for five years? But, that wasn’t his fault either. I was angry at the
therapists. Didn’t they have some idea how to have helped him through this
ordeal over the last five years? But, how often had they dealt with a situation
like this? It seemed surreal that something like this could happen.

The night wore on. The sun started to rise. I had to find a
paper bag for Roo to breathe into so he wouldn’t hyperventilate. There was no
consoling him. He screamed he didn’t want to die, over and over again. All we
could do is try to comfort him and wait for the day to be over. A day that
should have been joyful but turned into an emotional nightmare.

He lived.

Is he still traumatized at times? Very much so. Has he
experienced PTSD over other situations? You bet. But, nothing as colossal or
over such a long period of time. It’s something the whole family still feels on
an exhausting level.

6 comments:

I am so sorry you went through that. Our daughter was treated for HPV and then it came back and the doctor told her that because she was so close to the first set of treatments that it would reduce her resistance and she could die in her sleep from a cold. The result was she would not sleep. She drank herself in to a drunken stupor and then she got into an accident and voluntarily went in for treatment. I am so sorry you, your family and your son went through that.

So sorry for Roo's torment. Hopefully Roo can be a happy boy again now that his tenth birthday has passed. It is sad that some children can be so cruel.Roo is a beautiful boy.God Bless Roo and his family. Marilyn

I wish I knew this when I was teaching this amazing kid. He is so wonderful. It hurts my heart that he went through this. People just don't realize how small things to some are huge things to others. I remember when he was freaking out over the texture of the paper his assignments were on. I would give up so quickly until one day it hit me, "I have to change the feel some how." I handed him a washcloth to set under his hand and the issue was no more. He worked hard and made so much progress. He's a strong kid. I wish everyone realized how great he i s and how much potential he has still trapped inside of him. {{{Hugs}}}

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